The Darren Aronofsky film Noah, starring Russell Crowe, is set to be banned in Indonesia by the Indonesian Censorship Board on the basis of portraying a religious figure. The story of Noah and his world renown ark are present in the religious texts of Christianity, Judaism, as well as Islam. Although the overseers of Christianity and Judaism are a little more lenient when it comes to the treatment of religious figures. In Islam, it is prohibited to depict a prophet as a person. They believe that this avoids the worship of a person and keeps the focus on God.
Russell Crowe seems to be one of the most upset about it, he understands the religious constraints for most people but he doesn’t appreciate how most of the film’s detractors haven’t even seen it. The Indonesian Censorship Board has told the local media that anyone who chooses to show the film will be punished. The Indonesian Censorship Board responds by saying that the country highly respects religion and the value of unity and cites these as the reason for their decision. Their decision comes after censors from Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain to also decided to the ban the film. Many of the cinemas in Indonesia have already started to comply with the wishes of the board, but it isn’t sitting too well with the Indonesian film critics. They feel that the people are too stern and playing the people for sheep.
I personally have no angst towards either Mr. Crowe or Mr. Aronofsky, but I would like to say……….why? Hollywood feels the need to put its on little twist on everything and have a depiction of it. That’s not even the part that troubles me, what troubles me is Hollywood’s insistence upon action-izing and hero-fying everything. From what I read and what I was told, Noah was more of a feeble old man that God chose to work with not the Gladiator. With all this being said, I have no real idea of how the film plays out and I am basing my opinion off of the theatrical poster. Although, the movie drops in North America on March 28th. Have a ball.